


Sense of Smell

by Hobble_Dragon_Writing



Category: Borderlands
Genre: F/F, Ficlet, Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-14
Updated: 2016-07-14
Packaged: 2018-07-23 21:27:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,144
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7480776
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hobble_Dragon_Writing/pseuds/Hobble_Dragon_Writing
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What would one good deep whiff of someone you loved tell you? Just a bit of fluff concerning how the smells of a relationship are important.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sense of Smell

**Author's Note:**

> Not really sure how well 'maybe later sexy time' implied making out might go over so just put it as Teen+. No actually sexy time was portrayed in the writing of this ficlet. Mordecai and Brick have a few lines but they are not the focus.

It was the fourth time she had caught Brick staring at her during their game of Bunkers & Badasses: Battleborn Edition. It was a new expansion Rhys had managed to acquire through Atlas connections. Athena had picked Rath this time and she was dangerously close to throwing the extra pointy figure piece at the oversized man’s eye. “Before I lodge this die into your nostril, why do you keep staring at me, Brick?!”

“You smell different,” he replied before roll checking an attack.

All in one motion, the small woman, picked up her Rath figure piece; jabbed her finger down as its placeholder, and started twirling the small plastic model tween her fingers as she lined up with one of Brick’s eyes, “Say that again?”  
  
Mordecai waved his propped up feet, “He’s right. You smell different.”

Eyes narrowed, Athena looked over toward the hunter, arm never wavering with its projectile spinning between nimble fingers, “What does that mean?”

“You’ve been living with another person, Janey,” DM Maya cut her eyes up from her move and attack log then back down in a flash, “for long enough now. I’m sure that your smells have mingled.”

“Not a bad smell, surely,” Sal double checked his stats before setting up for an attack with his Boldur figure.  
There was verbal silence as dice were rolled and damage was counted. Athena thumped her figure back down in its place before turning her full attention back to Brick, “Then why do you keep staring at me?!”

Large shoulders shrugging, Brick made his El Dragon plastic figure wiggle in a little dance as he moved it behind an enemy figure, “Not like I can just up and sniff you. Had to make sure I was right.”

Mordecai’s heavy boots banged against the concrete flooring as he moved to lean forward, husky voice grumbling out as he shifted, “His nose isn’t as good as mine. Not a bad shift in smell,” he lined up his Caldarius figure for a flank. “Smell less cold, less of blood, less anger,” a rueful growled laugh forced out of Mordecai’s throat at his last words. Taking a deep breath that doubled as an intake of scent, Mordecai kept on, “More engine oil. More comforting heat. More battery electricity.” The lean man’s dice rolled completely in his favor and he clapped his hands as a grin to split metals broke his face. In the middle of a game it was near impossible for him remember how much this game ‘bored’ him.

Shifting again to prop his feet back up, the grin didn’t leave his face as he talked, “I’m sure when you was with your squad you all smelled overall the same. Small differences from person to person.” Fingers laced behind his head, “Spot behind the ear. Get a good sniff of your woman.”

 

Good games always have a way of making time blink hours by in minutes for its players. Tonight was no different and Athena knew that Janey was sound asleep somewhere strange in their small home and garage. Rubbing the bridge of her nose and by proxy her eyes, the blue haired woman was able to get inside the home door by memory alone. Eyes still closed, she kicked her boots off in a corner by the door and rolled her neck through some deep pops. An itch along the side of her neck accompanied her eyes opening and a lazy yawn trailed afterward. Athena’s fingers scratched then smoothed upward against the delicate hollow behind her earlobe. Mordecai’s words echoed inside her head.

Fingers lingering against her own flesh as her ears perked, listening for soft snores of a pooped junker. The ex-Gladiator didn’t have to listen hard or far. Silently moving into the small living room, Athena was able to make out Janey sleeping on her stomach along the well-loved couch. More and more, the two were finding it hard to sleep in their bed when the other was missing. At first it only made Athena question: why? Now it was something she accepted as a good thing in her ever growing education of how normal folks lived. It was something that increasingly brought a small smile to her normally scowling or dead-set lips.

That little smile had disappeared as she knelt down beside the limp arm hanging from the cushion edges. Silently she ran her fingers through the shaggy blonde hair of the turned away head. A soft whiny groan muffled against the couch. Voice and movements sluggish, Janey pulled her hand up to hook numb fingers against couch edge and turned her face toward Athena, “Can’t feel my arm.”

“Not sleeping like that you wouldn’t,” the reply was a warm murmur. Janey huffed a small smile as she leaned forward and pressed a sleepy, warm kiss against her fiance's lips. Kiss naturally breaking, Athena gave a content grunt as her fingers scratched amongst Janey’s short hair. A few sweet pulls of lips with teeth and gentle prodding moved the two along the couch so Janey ended up straddling Athena's lap.

The smaller woman’s hot hands were leaving swaths of tingling skin as they smoothed against Janey’s hips and back. “Good game?” was a hot mutter against Athena's neck. An acknowledging grunt from Athena’s throat answered so her lips and teeth could keep soothing and nipping along Janey’s jaw. As her tongue started to peek out, Athena remembered Mordecai’s words again. The pause in motion was so swift the now fully awake and distracted junker in her lap didn’t notice the change from Athena. Not enough distraction tho to hide the deep intake of air that tickled against the soft skin behind Janey’s ear. Shivers ran up and down her spine in a startling sensation. Stroking fingers suddenly gripped into blue hair, pulling enough for the mechanic to see her fiance’s face, “Smell somethin’ bad?”  
  
Amazing things about the mind most take for granted is how fast it processes so many things at once. A blink of the eyes, a warm intake of wonderfully scented air, and all the sights and smells and feels ahead of you are painted into a new picture. Janey’s smell had changed. More blade oil. More heat of battle. More elemental weapon ozone. Athena’s fingers were playing with the raised hem of Janey’s shirt, “No. Defiantly, nothing bad.”  
  
Moving on their own, Janey's fingers combed through the small gladiator’s hair, head tilting now in confusion instead of arousal, “Now, I’m really suspicious. You’re not much for cryptic. More stonewall blunt secret keepin’. What’cha smellin’?”  
  
A firm, rough hand gently gripped the back of Janey’s neck, pulling her face closer. The free other hand tickling down along her spine, lips so close they tickled each other. Dark brown eyes dancing the lover’s dance with startling blue ones as the souls behind them grew lost in each other, “Us.”


End file.
